Saving MY Slideshow

[NewAtThis04]

Ok, I'm new at this.. so bear with me please. I'm making a slideshow
presentation of my Grandparents for them as a present for christmas, I'm
wondering if I can save my slideshow onto a DVD or whatever it is, so that I
can play it for them onto the TV & they can watch it together... or can the
presentation only be played onto a computer? I don't know how I would go
about doing this, so any help is greatly appriciated!

 

[Sonia]

PowerPoint does not provide this capability, so you would have to use third
party software. See http://www.powerpointbackgrounds.com/powerpoint-to-dvd.htm
as a place to start.

 

[NewAtThis04]

Thanks sonia, is this "third party" somthing i download or buy? And is it
safe for my computer?

 

[Sonia]

The link that I provided is a tutorial that uses Camtasia which is perfectly
safe and has a free trial period. However it is only the first step in the
process. It captures your presentation as a video file. You must have a DVD
burner and you should be prepared for a loss in quality. TV's don't give you
the fine resolution that you are used to with computer monitors. Also, if you
use animations and slide transitions, they probably won't be as smooth as when
you play the presentation on your system.

You'll also need to know what type of DVDs your grandparents machine will play
and then be sure that your burner can use that type (DVD+R, DVD-R, DVD RAM) and
that you purchase the correct type of blank DVDs. When designing the
presentation, leave an unused margin all around the slide because the television
will truncate it. Use large bold high-contrast fonts and avoid the use of the
color red. I also recommend avoiding gradients and use a plain dark background
on the slide.

In other words, it's not a fast and easy task and might involve trial and error.
If your grandparents still have a VCR, you might want to consider that route.
See http://www.soniacoleman.com/Tutorials/PowerPoint/recordvhs.htm

 

[Jane_ly33]

Another software choice is PowerPoint2DVD, it is a pretty application
and does it well too ,you can just have a try at
www.powerpoint-to-dvd.com